Exhibitions

Mapping America’s Road from Revolution to Independence

Mapping America’s Road from Revolution to Independence showcases hand-drawn and engraved maps from the 18th and early 19th centuries that illuminate the tremendous changes—geographic, political, and economic—that occurred before, during, and just after the Revolutionary War. The exhibition features rarely displayed manuscripts and printed maps from New-York Historical’s own premier collection, including the original manuscript surveys of Robert Erskine, Geographer and Surveyor General of the Continental Army, and his successor Simeon De Witt. Also on display will be John Jay’s personal copy of John Mitchell’s Map of the British and French Dominions in North America (1755) to which hand-drawn red lines representing proposed boundaries were added during the negotiations of the Treaty of Paris, 1782 - 1783. This exhibition was organized by the Norman B. Leventhal Map Center at the Boston Public Library as We Are One: Mapping America’s Road from Revolution to Independenceand curated at New-York Historical by Nina Nazionale, Director of Library Operations and Curator of Printed Collections. The book, Revolution: Mapping the Road to American Independence, 1755-1783, is available for purchase at the NYHistory Store.

Lead support for We Are One provided by Mary Jo Otsea and Richard H. Brown. Additional support provided by the Berkley Family Foundation, Gerry Lenfest, the Sherry and Alan Leventhal Family Foundation, Mr. and Mrs. Samuel C. Butler, William B. Ginsberg, Ruth and Sid Lapidus, William S. Reese, Tom and Lee Touchton, and an anonymous donor.

Exhibitions at New-York Historical are made possible by Dr. Agnes Hsu-Tang and Oscar Tang, the Saunders Trust for American History, the Seymour Neuman Endowed Fund, the New York City Department of Cultural Affairs in partnership with the City Council, and the New York State Council on the Arts with the support of Governor Andrew Cuomo and the New York State Legislature. WNET is the media sponsor.

John Jay’s personal copy of John Mitchell’s Map of the British and French Dominions in North America... (London, 1755), copperplate engraving with hand-drawn red lines added during the negotiations of the Treaty of Paris, 1782-1783. New-York Historical Society

Sebastian Bauman (1739–1803). To His Excellency Genl. Washington, Commander in Chief of the Armies of the United States of America . . . Is Most Humbly Dedicated by His Excellency’s Obedient Servant . . . Philadelphia: Robert Scot, 1782. Engraving, hand-colored. New-York Historical Society Library

Bernard Ratzer (fl. 1756–1777). Plan of the City of New York in North America, Surveyed in the years 1766 & 1767. New York, 1770, Engraving
New-York Historical Society Library